jailed members greenpeace activists in. trouble with the law could soon be set free amnesty bill president vladimir putin. peacefully dismantling barricades and moving protesters off the streets to traffic through the move mascara among the opposition to the crackdown underway. the n.s.a. apparently invents a new approach to playing games that work has its agents lead a double life among fantasy creatures in the online gaming world. and the government steps up its drive against pro reform activists as the number of those arrested edges closer to the three thousand.

nine pm this is international and breaking news this hour up to twenty five thousand people in russia could see their crimes forgiven and a new proposal by the pussy rock band members and even kremlin activists convicted of inciting unrest coud be eligible for release while the high profile greenpeace activists may escape prosecution well the details with. too good to be true for the moment. while still russian. prisoners. awaiting trial will be really following the passage of this law quite closely as. al as they along with twenty five thousand other issue may see the

charges against them dropped and of the record their records wiped clean now you know move the government hopes will foster trust between and its people and now what we know so far is that the russian our president vladimir putin has already. documents to the state duma deputies and he might be approved as early as today by the end of this year now the main question is of course who will abandon if it out of this amnesty among those people who might be pardoned by those convicted of hooliganism and paving are the members of the cohen group pussy riot currently serving their two year prison sentence as well as the thirty greenpeace activists from the greenpeace vassal arctic sunrise who have just recently been released on bail and are currently awaiting trial ensign petersburg and number of fancy kremlin

activists who have been charged with the inciting riots and rest and what about russia's highest profile prisoner we called. what about him could he be set free. while it is already doubtful whether. could fall into this category as the amnesty does not impact those people convicted for various serious crimes and one so russia's a reaches man has been convicted of stealing billions from the state on this indeed fools into the category of a serious crime so it is a very doubtful remedy in effect very much indeed for that update not from saddam was going to be the question of. right police have started this mounting barricades in the center of the ukrainian capital and moving protesters away from blockaded streets tensions being high for the whole day with reports of an imminent crackdown frequently surfacing. is that. i am here right now in kiev

central defender square the essentially the heart of the protest and i personally haven't seen any dismantling going on now and that is not to say that the police aren't doing just that on any other smaller protest walking the streets a little bit further away from the central square people been getting the upper hand shown on the rise here throughout the day largely because of the numerous messages that were saying that the police are coming in and their main amos is essentially squash the protests right here in independence square that is not happening right now there is also information coming in from one of the opposition parties were claiming that the police are currently storming their headquarters again no confirmation of that as well in fact of the minister rather the interior he has said that their main aim is to clear out the streets because the city essentially has been paralyzed by traffic jam so what they want to do is to dismantle the blockade and to push the protest on to protesters onto the sidewalks

in order to free up the traffic but other than that again according to the ministry of internal affairs they want to keep this peaceful and there's absolutely no plans to squash out the protesters from independence square one key supporter in the ukrainian capital where neither the police nor the protesters have a hold of the moment is the presidential palace in ati's paul scott witnessed the situation that brought now you can see how tense the situation is we're in a sort of no man's land outside the presidential palace and to my right hand side you can see a line of riot police who formed a blockade not allowing any protesters in but if you pan around to my left hand side you can see the protesters have set up their own blockade not allowing anyone in to carry out their official business and we're left with this rather tense standoff it's clear that when the situation is tense is there any misinformation with the deliberate or not has the potential for huge consequences both scots. kiev

ukraine. and we are of course following the developments in the ukrainian capital on air and online also on our web site r.t. dot com you can find the most dramatic photos and videos from the on going protests . america's national security agency has apparently been leading an active life in a fantasy world it's been sending its highest level agents into the hordes of all elves and dwarves in online games such as world of warcraft. these revelations center around two games that's world of warcraft and second life these are basically alternative online universes where users can create avatars they can be no elves or trolls the fear that g c h q and the n.s.a. had was that this type of online game could be used to discard is shady activity on

the part of terrorist networks or criminal groups which is why they have been spying on the people playing these games which is basically involves them assuming fantasy identities and jumping in and getting stuck in we know that there are a lot of play is online playing these games around forty eight million according to the estimate by x. box live that in fact it seems to have been quite a big operation the cia the f.b.i. and pentagon even had to reportedly create a special d confliction group in order to stop all the spies from spying on each other or effectively playing one massive washington network game of world of warcraft and perhaps most embarrassing really from what we know from the leaked documents is that none of this buying has led to any successful counterterrorism operations which has led to some suggestions online that it could have all been an elaborate ploy by board employees at g.c. h.q. in the n.s.a.

to simply play computer games at work but certainly the n.s.a. have said that they can't comment on this d.c. h.q. said that they can't confirm or deny it but it raises questions once again about the online privacy of gamers it doesn't come at a good time either today is the day that facebook microsoft google and other large tech companies have written an open letter to the u.s. government asking them to dramatically change their surveillance operations so no matter how you spin it it just doesn't look good when you find out that g c h q and the n.s.a. have been found to be playing world of warcraft. bahrain's throne another group of activists including minors behind bars bringing the total number of those arrested in december alone to twenty eight protesters say in recent months the government's crackdown has become in sufferable of the bahraini people struggle for reform goes back almost three years now to february two thousand and eleven when four demonstrators were killed as a police crushed a rally well less than

a month later the authorities imposed martial law which allowed troops to suppress the dissent by that time the number of those arrested sort of a thousand and that is increased threefold by now but legal and physical pressure on the activists as failed to kill the protest momentum and more nikki reacted by further tightening the screws this year toughening the punishments for those speaking out but as live reports this is still unlikely to silence the opposition. it's the arab spring this forgotten revolution nearly three years have gone by since the people of the rain inspired by the ancient unison and egypt goes up against an oppressive regime and demanded reform but their uprising was brutally crushed within a matter of weeks who have published their name and the picture of for the people responsible of the grave human rights violation in my country. starting from this morning when a police officer and minister of interior reaching to the king of bahrain who is

legally responsible of all the human rights violations and syud yousif elmo hafter has been forced to seek refuge in europe because of death threats against him and his family and i gather bahraini activists he criticizes washington and its allies for being quick to condemn crackdowns in some countries while ignoring others oh it was better than the human rights in bahrain and it was said to us it's better than human rights as a diversion or better and so that's why we are a victims. of their better standard because we live in oil last week the global manami dialogue forum pointedly ignored the crackdown u.s. secretary of defense chuck hagel made it clear in his speech that he was more concerned about military matters they want to feel that there are some you are really body are slaves so that's why they don't want anyone to talk about the force you are looking at that if they give them cross see that they are losing oh lord

even. so very much thanks so far according to amnesty international more than a hundred people have been killed and almost three thousand imprisoned in the bahraini protests many more have been tortured in a crackdown there for mainz a father moved from the world's attention policia our teen. bar any politician. who was arrested this autumn says the government's determined to deal with the public discontent in its own way. the problem back then is very basic to understand we have absolutely. concentrated been behind families and we need doors or thirty's to be shared. by the people through an inclusive political system that is retaining the power through the people through our floor was never meant to have an illegal law compared to the international

community stand and your own force advised police and courts that is one of the party so i thought was just part of the punishment and part of the threats. to the acquisition and the activists not to join the movement that calling for simple rights universal rights of their people to be equal to have big negative to participate in political system and to have the bloc meant that despaired with everyone. imagine watching your house literally crumble in front of your eyes and not be able to do anything about it and that's how texans living near fracking sites feel right now coming up we're reporting the. premises that are making life hell for intel our communities in north texas and how locals have found oil from the politicians of bolivia that predicted that story after the break.

cleaner. love with a waitress on stage managing that there's an audience you should take drugs and drink like a. little lisa told me about the circus but i was such a punk i was like what circus. circus and clearly it's going to. break down stereotypes about kids from disadvantaged. economic down the final.

international law of her moscow let's return to one of the earliest stories now news that america's national security agency has been sending as high level agents in to all nine games such as world of warcraft where john hicks is editor of exports magazine he joins me live to talk more about this he's in london tens of millions of people play these sort of games don't they what are the chances of catching actual terrorists among them. i would say the chances would be pretty large i mean there are a huge number of players and they do and people who spend a lot of time in these games they form a kind of last ing social. arrangements of people as a rich history of people getting married having messy not world of warcraft and that kind of thing. i must confess to being

a bit flummoxed as to how you would actually track down terrorists and limits and it's not doesn't really seem like the sort of environment where you could do it we could do that easily and what would terrorists get out of playing one of these games how would they benefit what would they learn what would they be doing. and i think the only thing that you could say that they would learn from it would just be to kind of build you know as i said like lost in relationships of people because these games of so vast and play spend so much time in there that kind of team up and go on quests and that kind of stuff it seems like the sort of thing where you know would be a good way to you know to meet people to kind of build you know build up a friendship and maybe trying to seduce people around to your way of thinking but there are no obvious ways to you know to turn the conversation around terrorism at all that i can think of i mean you know you could argue that the kind of more popular sort of. you know the n.s.a. did say that it's. been monitoring exports noya basically called jesus very popular

in exports lojban there's a big. but there's a sizeable number of military people who use that. and use that service so that it could conceivably be more useful it would be companies who produce these games would they be in any way cooperating with the n.s.a. because of course there have been reports that companies have been indeed in cahoots with the national security agency. well the following today's news blizzards who are the publisher of world of warcraft they've come out and explicitly stated that if there was any monitoring it would happen without their knowledge. i don't believe has come and said but it has been very vocal about resistance to these things. publicly stated that it doesn't. it hasn't allowed wide scale access while it has supplied specific information it's been deployed noisy in its attempts to kind of lobby the government it's been like a kind of open letters to president obama asking for. asking for the ability to be

able to reveal more about what they're doing and even this morning signed up to go to europe arrangements with some other companies to restrict access and just very quickly would current gamers and indeed potential gamers be put off by this does this actually affect the online gaming business just briefly. i don't think so based on the reaction to today's news i think most gamers seem to think it's all just. people just playing games at work but i think following the you know the scale of the n.s.a. revelations we've had for the snowden files i think it's hasn't really come as a surprise to anybody like the fact that you know the n.s.a. is already monitoring social networks now so the saying that games are also on the list hasn't really surprised anybody and it doesn't seem to be you know putting anybody off. exports magazine live from london thanks for joining us.

the u.s. defense secretary has met with leaders in islamabad and despite the handshakes for the camera tensions remain over the deadly drone attacks carried out on pakistani soil that story coming up very shortly. first a year's worth of quakes have hit texas in just one month in large part thanks to the practice of fracking the so say experts the state is at the forefront of the show gas revolution and oil firms are generating billions in taxes result he's got a church can find out entire communities crack and crumble the support of politicians for the drilling remains i'm shaken. the columns have shaken so hard it's actually pulled the tram if you look around here rebecca williams is showing me the cracks in her home after a series of earthquakes shook the area she has lived here for almost a decade and had never experienced an earthquake until fracking begin in her neighborhood i never know when the next one's going to hear it i don't sleep at

night because they keep me awake at night it seems like a lot of them happened during the wee hours of the morning or in the middle of the night to texas real world commission the local agency that regulates the oil and gas industries trying to calm the residents who use it claims there is no direct link between the recent troubles and fracking injection wells in the area but locals are not convinced it's a lot like living next to a time bomb but there's no timer on it because we aren't being told when the fracking is going to start or what the emergency perp seizures are in place if something does happen and so you're just constantly sitting and waiting and wondering is today the day is today the day so small a juice with the u.s. geological survey say fracking regularly triggers small earthquakes they foresee an even greater danger from wastewater disposal which involves pumping millions of gallons of water contaminated by chemicals deep underground where experts say it

puts pressure on seismic faults and causes them to slip but despite seismologist warnings fracking wealth keep popping up just a few steps away from private homes and even community water wells nobody knows about any of this until it's too late and if i already have it. even though the government is not concluded studies on how fracking can affect the environment well operations are in full swing here in texas there are thousands of them impossible to miss and it seems no study can get in the industry's way if in fact you're asking the question of whether something could happen to halt shale production the united states i think it is high. unlikely it is extremely beneficial to the national economy psyching is being largely responsible for the boom in u.s. energy production but maybe like fear they could be left to pay the price for her every week there is another tremor and another crack in her house she says she can't even sell it and leave the area we would have never moved here if we would

have thought that all of this was going to go up and we were going to live in the middle of a wasteland we would have never moved here and now are stuck while energy companies are rubbing their hands in the anticipation of gigantic profits from fracking people who live just steps away from gas wells or increasingly fearful about the water that they drink about the land that their homes are standing on and they don't trust the government assessment of the damage from fracking because they say the oil and gas industry will make sure that no conclusive study comes out even if it does come out that it doesn't become a basis for effective regulations in texas i'm going to check on. well let's break down for you why people are so worried about fracking many people believe that the chemicals used in this process could accumulate in the soil causing water and even pollution of his claim there are more than a thousand documented cases of contamination in drilling sites the health risks

could include sensory and respect of damage from on the dangers of fracking you can head to our web site or to dot com the u.s. defense secretary chuck hagel is and in pakistan to try and on out entrenched differences between washington and is none of that american drone strikes or is central sticking point and they've killed almost a thousand civilians in the country since two thousand and three and triggered a wave of protests that blocked nato supply trucks to afghanistan two weeks ago freelance journalist bebe is in islamabad for us. but this is the first visit by the u.s. defense secretary. to pakistan in four years which shows how much the u.s. wants to build a relationship with pakistan and ease tensions which have been occurring over these drone attacks. recently nationwide protests have been occurring in pakistan america insists that these drone strikes are essential include bashing terrorists despite pakistani protests saying it's not

a threat to national security and i tacked on their sovereignty as well recently a family from pakistan traveled to washington and spoke to congress and told them about this story and the impact it all strikes have had on their lives there have been recently confiding vosh sharif and president obama in washington and the drone strikes have still continued many politicians and analysts and wondering and journalists wondering what will be the outcome of today's talks and whether that is actually any point in chuck hagel visit and i think will be result because so far nothing has. now for some more global headlines this hour in our world update a series of blasts in iraq have killed twenty one people but that is happening in the kilometers east of baghdad that killed eleven people more than twenty were also injured when the car bomb went off near a cafe in sony in a sunni muslim area iraqi security forces are struggling to tame

a wave of violence is pushed the number of casualties this year is highest level since two thousand and eight. french troops have started taking control of checkpoints in the capital of the central african republic as they confiscate weapons from opposing groups and try to stifle ongoing unrest earlier shooting broke out near the airport when a number of fighters refused to surrender their arms the pentagon is reporting taking part in the french operation sixteen hundred french soldiers have been deployed in the nation wracked by sectarian violence. so not to bring it up to date for the moment but with the news team with more for in just over half an hour all the thrills and spills from the world of sport coming up very shortly. just imagine a foreign leaders like alexander lukashenko of lattimer putin to shoot up an anti

e.u. protest and all garia greece are hungry to urge people to leave the e.u. and join up with the eurasian customs union obviously the media would be on fire screaming that this is part of an attempt to use up democracy and steal the country's away some sort of imperialist agenda and you know what they might be right about that but the weird thing is that for some reason the mainstream media isn't talking about foreign politicians speaking to and or possibly agitating protesters in ukraine like speaker of the lithuanian parliament loreto grows in india and vice president got sick put to sea of each and former polish pm jaroslav kaczynski yeah the european union brassfield is just fine for their politicians to go to foreign countries and fire up protestors to start a pro e.u. revolution but then all their journalist write about is how russia is trying to put pressure on ukraine to not join the e.u. the obvious hypocrisy of this stinks all the way up to moscow but the shust by painting.

hello welcome to the r t sports show half an hour of top action from russia and around the globe with me kate partridge and here's what's coming up. the road to

rio fabio capello is a happy coach as russia draw belgium algeria and south korea in their group for next summer's world cup finals. plus a big battle scarred defeated by ten hours the moscow traffic while champions an hour overcome even for act passed in the k h l. and in the cage we have a double helping of heaven made with a master class from probably see over there and frank mir and the latest action from moscow's fight night. but first to world cup football and russia coach fabio capello was pleased with his side's opponents and much venue's after russia avoided the big guns at the draw for the twenty fourteen finals in brazil. reports the draw for nixon was world cup finals couldn't have got much better but the russian. capello's side avoided the lines of defending champions spain free

time winners germany and brazil they were drawn in the last group age and with belgium signs career. and we play the munches in a much cooler climate of the south. we're happy about the draw we're also happy about the fact that we're not playing in the northern part of the country that's very important to us. russia were drawn in the same group as belgium the last time they qualified for war camp in two thousand and two on but occasionally lost forty two before crashing out of the group stage for midfielder alexander must avoid played in the tournament for the russians and says despite drawing be informed belgians their opponents could have been much tougher language there's a lot of people say belgium are a really top side but then again if you ask the majority of people who they want in a group belgium or argentina belgium or germany belgium or spain everyone would say

belgium and this sums it all up because. russia have never played no jiri or a face time career in a friendly only in november which they won two one things to goals from the field a small oven to be to turn out so that result will have little bearing when world cup gets underway with capello's men opening against a career ends in cuiaba on june seventeenth a must have only expects the russians to be in with a chance of reaching the knockout stages view i think russia and belgium of the two favorites to qualify from the group but we shouldn't forget about the south koreans who we recently beat in a friendly or is there a fast and very mobile side however if everything goes to plan and i think we should be able to make it out of the group capello is a ready said the squad will be based in the city of campion us which is around one hundred kilometers northwest of south paolo the city is within easy reach of russia's free playing venue's rio de janeiro who.